Mom blogger Michelle Villemaire (a.k.a. home*made mimi) embarked on a new DIY project on her blog last week: correcting the “yellowface” of white American actresses in Asian roles. The project stemmed from, as most projects do, a lifelong frustration that finally came to a head.
Actors in film and television don’t look the way normal people do; for the most part, they look better. It’s their job. However, casting white actors in Asian roles turns that narrative into something (even more) insidious and damaging. Villemaire writes:
Growing up, I didn’t see many faces like mine on television and film. And because I wanted to be an actor it was really hard to believe that I could ever be one. Only women who had a certain skin color and eye shape were really allowed on screen, right? To this day white people are cast as Asians, deepening the message that Asians just aren’t wanted.